Samsung Galaxy S5: Will it Have a Fingerprint Sensor?

Samsung is set to launch its Galaxy S5 smartphone at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona on 24 February at its Unpacked 5 Event, and rumors today seem to confirm that the phone will come with an inbuilt fingerprint sensor.

Reports from Samsung news site SamMobile claim that the Galaxy S5 will definitely have a fingerprint sensor built into its home button, not in the smartphone’s display as many rumors had previously said. The S5 has also been reported to have retina scanning technology built into the camera, but Samsung seems to have scrapped this in favor of the fingerprint sensor.

To activate the fingerprint sensor in the S5’s home button, you’ll have to swipe the entire pad of your finger across the scanner, being sure to keep your finger flat and moving at a medium speed. You’ll also have to make sure that your finger is dry, otherwise the scan won’t register. Phew, sounds pretty complicated, but we’re sure it will make more sense when we see it. The Galaxy S5’s display will also show an image of your fingerprint as you’re scanning it.

The Galaxy S5 will be able to store up to eight fingerprints to unlock various apps or complete different tasks but you’ll need to assign at least one fingerprint to unlock the smartphone.

The fingerprint reader isn’t the only new feature we can expect to see unveiled on the Galaxy S5 next Monday. The flagship smartphone for Samsung will reportedly feature a 5.25 inch Super AMOLED display, a front camera at 16 megapixels – or possibly even 20 megapixels – and a 2.5 GHz Snapdragon 800 processor. The S5 will also have an updated TouchWiz User Interface, hopefully giving the smartphone a brand new look.

We at The Snugg will be reporting on all the news from Samsung’s Unpacked 5 Event at MWC next week, so stay tuned for all the updates.